I took a look this morning at a news digest from the Minnesota State Bar Association. A story that caught my eye was full of charts and graphs comparing the number of lawyers admitted to the bar to practice law compared with the number of job openings. You can see the full story at economicmodeling.com.
For the year 2010 Minnesota had a lawyer surplus of 510, according to the article. Only New York, California, New Jersey, Illinois, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Texas, Florida, Maryland Connecticut, and North Carolina had bigger surpluses. The nation as a whole had a lawyer surplus of $27,269.
Interesting enough, our neighbor Wisconsin actually had a lawyer deficit of 14. In other words, Wisconsin had 14 more job openings than there were new lawyers to fill them. The only other state with a deficit was Nebraska. Nebraska’s deficit was only three, however; pretty close to break even.
Whenever I get a call from my Alma mater, the University of Minnesota Law School, asking for a financial donation, I have had to ask myself whether I feel that Minnesota really needs more lawyers. The answer to that question for me has always been in the negative. This article seems to confirm that.
